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DNC files motion to intervene in at-large precincts case

Comments

You know, I started out this election as a gung-ho Hillary Clinton booster. I thought she was experienced and despite the epithets tossed out at Bill, I figured it might not be a bad idea to have his advice on board.

But after this mess, I will never, ever for Hillary Clinton. Ever!

Look, I know many of us have issues with the caucus system, but the time to raise those issues was months ago. And for all its flaws, the current system moves in the right direction because it helps to enfranchise people who are busy and have to work on Saturdays. This is what every good precinct works hard to do.

But now, with Hillary losing the Culinary Union's endorsement-- one damn week before the caucus, they pull this crap??

Those culinary union and other workers bust their tails on the weekends when most of us are either gambling or relaxing in some other method, and we should be working darn hard to ensure that they have the right to vote and that their votes are facilitated. Not trying to disenfranchise them at the last moment!

All of this on top of the Clinton campaign's comments bordering on race-baiting against Obama, and it adds up to a campaign that I can never support.

I won't vote for Hillary in November if she's nominated, nor will anybody else in my office. She's not attacking Obama with these tactics, she's attacking voters, our country and the concept of democracy itself. If she's nominated, all of us will either stay home, write in a Presidential candidate or vote for John McCain, as painful as that it is to imagine for most of us, who have been Democrats ever since we started casting ballots.

Hillary Clinton and her supporters (those who are still supporters) should be ashamed. I jumped off of the Hillary ship after this, and I urge all other Clinton supporters to do the same. These actions cannot stand!

It's easy to attack Hillary Clinton. After all, since she is not the candidate Culinary endorsed, It's easy to point the finger at her for asking the individuals who originated the lawsuit, and the Education Association who signed on, to try and stop workers from being able to caucus. It is just that easy to also ignore certain crucial elements of this matter:
1) The lawsuit addresses unfair delegation designating practices that were established long before Culinary endorsed anyone. They were given their own set of rules at the at large sites by the State Democratic Party. If Culinary had endorsed Hillary, it wouldn't change the issue that the Culinary sites are poised to get one delegate for every 5 participants, while every other site in the state gets one delegate for every FIFTY. That means if 400 participants show up at a neighborhood site, they get 8 delegates. if the same number of parrticipants go to the at large sites, they get 80.
2) The rules for these at large sites prohibit workers from "entities" that have less than 4000 workers working that day. While that works great for Culinary workers, it disenfranchises workers from smaller entities from participating, including many smaller unions that have endorsed a candidate other than Obama.
3) Far from being a tactic by the Clinton campaign, this lawsuit was originated by individual members of the State Central Committee, not all Hillary supporters, who were "mysteriously" kicked off Central Committee last year, at exactly the time thes rules were finalized. One of these individuals, John Hunt, was lucky enough to catch what was going on as he was going through the by-laws to prepare for the Clark County Democrats convention a little more than a week or so ago. At that time, those individuals who were kicked off (and returned to the committee with apologies at a later time, I might add)realized WHY they were kicked off at that time (so that no one would object to the tipping of the scales of caucus influence in favor of Culinary)they were understandably upset enough to generate the lawsuit. They also invited all unions represented in the area to join them, and the Education Association agreed to.
This is not about Hillary or Barak. This is about Nevada insider politics, down and dirty. The next question to ask, since now the lawsuit has been struck down by a judge (who stopped short of ordering the state party to fix the "unfair" designation of delegates), is why? Why would the state party give Culinary that kind of "king maker" status in the Nevada Caucus? Could it have anything to do with Harry Reid, who has been accused by some of using the State Party as his "unofficial" campaign office, and his wanting to make sure he has Culinary backing should he decide to run again in 2010? Maybe not, but someone should be digging a little deeper here. How about it, Mr. Ralston?
To those who still don't see what has transpired here, and find it much easier to just blame Hillary, that's fine I guess. Her true courage and strength becomes more and more apparent with every naysayer and detractor that lines up to take a swipe at her bloodied yet unbowed good name. That's the kind of individual, man or woman, white or black, that I want to be my president.

Whoa! At the precinct I attended, 8254 in South Reno, we determined the number of votes necessary to determine a delegate by dividing the number of people *who showed up* by .15. It was called "viability." The actual number of delegates was chosen in advance, and I thought it was determined by population in the precinct.

Those culinary union and other workers bust their tails on the weekends when most of us are either gambling or relaxing in some other method, and we should be working darn hard to ensure that they have the right to vote and that their votes are facilitated. Not trying to disenfranchise them at the last moment.